(Washington, DC) -- January 15, 1998 -- In response to rumors
that NASA will announce at 12 noon tomorrow that former astronaut
and now Senator John Glenn will fly aboard a future shuttle, Ms.
Pat Dasch, executive director for the National Space Society (NSS)
today said:

"We are anxiously awaiting NASA's rationale for flying Glenn,
if that is what they are announcing. From a biomedical standpoint,
the Senator represents a sample of an entirely new segment of the
population. His flight would involve new experiments to answer the
questions of how an older person reacts in space. In seeing these
results, will we see things we can apply to making older people
more comfortable on Earth?

However,
we believe that NASA should not make a decision about Glenn without
having also decided whether the same opportunity will be available
for those civilians who have already trained to go into space,
including Barbara Morgan, Christa McAuliffe's back-up. We would
welcome a 'Glenn is go' decision if it marks a policy change at
NASA on flying civilians. Restarting NASA's Civilians in Space
program would make it possible for experts in different areas, who
are not career astronauts, to accelerate development of a true
spacefaring civilization. If giving Glenn the green light is an
exception to the rule, we want to know why."

The National
Space Society is an independent, nonprofit space advocacy
organization with headquarters in Washington, DC. Its 25,000
members and 95 chapters around the world actively promote a
spacefaring civilization. For more information on the NSS and our
future in space, visit http://www.nss.org/.